


i do not lay here in the dark waiting for thee

by BugontheRug



Series: some say love is a burning thing [2]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2019-02-01
Packaged: 2019-08-03 07:43:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16322039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BugontheRug/pseuds/BugontheRug
Summary: Eddie's POV for select scenes from honey i am not some broken thing plus additional scenes.





	1. Chapter 1

Eddie pulled his new LAFD tee on and started buttoning up his uniform shirt. He heard laughter coming from the garage and looked to see his new boss with some of his new co-workers. He took a moment to appreciate the assets of the blond turned away from him making large hand gestures, before shaking his head and reminding himself he’s not looking for anyone right now. Especially not a co-worker.

As he straightened his shirt, his new boss approached him with the group minus the blond. 

“Eddie, this is Hen. Hen, Eddie.”

“Nice to meet you.” Eddie reached out a hand to shake. 

“Good to meet you too.” She replied with a smile.

“And this is Chimney. Chim, Eddie.”

“Nice to meet you.” Shaking the shorter man’s hand.

“Great to have you with us.” Over Chimney’s shoulder, Eddie watched the blond walk away.

“Who’s that?” He asked, using his chin to point to the retreating figure.

“Ah, that’s Buck.” Hen said amused, shaking her head. “Don’t mind him. Bringing in new recruits is always like bring home a newborn. Older sibling jealousy.”

“Oh, okay.” Eddie didn’t want to have any animosity between him or his co-workers, especially in this kind of job. He watched as Buck disappeared through a doorway and wondered if time would be enough to fix it.

***

When Chimney brought up his Silver Star, Eddie was thinking a mile a minute. It’s not that he’s ashamed of getting it or anything, it’s just, anyone would’ve done what he did and it made him uncomfortable to be praised for it. Plus it didn’t bring pleasant memories to mind and he’d rather not think about them.

But this, this was amazing. Buck trying to...he didn’t even know what Buck was trying to do. Size him up? Throw his weight around? Genuinely believed he needed a nickname and was that passionate about it? Whatever it was brought a smile to his face. 

Watching Buck shut down after his off the wall remark though made the smile drop from his face. From the little he saw of the blond man in the fire station he should be radiating energy, not this black hole before him. This situation with Buck was getting worse and Eddie doesn’t know ow he could make it better.


	2. Chapter 2

Eddie came into the gym strapping on his gloves and noted Buck was there lifting weights. He told his heart to stop fluttering, that he was twenty-eight and shouldn’t be acting like a teenager with a crush. Not that he has a crush because that would be unprofessional. And then because of...Eddie shook his head. He didn’t want to think about her.

He punched and kicked the punching bag, frustrated with his awareness of Buck. He’s sure he punched a bit harder when Buck was watching and could practically feel his back warm when Buck walked past him. Eddie tried his best to ignore him, but couldn’t ignore the selfie stick the other man took out.

If he was being honest, Buck looked like a dork. An adorably hot dork, but a dork nonetheless. He stopped his workout for a moment and pushed his sweaty bangs to the side as he said, “You're in the wrong light, man.” He knew Buck was trying to do something, rile him up, or maybe make him jealous? He wasn’t sure. As amusing as it was, it equally set him on edge. They were supposed to be a team, a brotherhood. It was the whole reason he joined the LAFD after leaving the army. He was getting along with everyone so far. Everyone except Buck. He shouldn’t care. Having one person out of the whole team not like shouldn’t matter to him. But it does. Whether it’s because of Buck himself or another reason, he’s not sure.

“Some of us don't need lighting to look good.”

Eddie shrugged, half in agreement and half in dismissal and was about to start his routine again when Chimney came up to him.

“Hey, Eddie, what'd you mean by ‘the wrong light’?”

“The light in this room is flat and blue. Makes you look soft. If you want to look lean and muscles to pop, you need warm side light. I'll show you. These are the ones I sent in for the calendar.” His heart beat a little faster when Buck leaned over his shoulder to look at his phone. He was like a solid wall that radiated heat and he had to stop himself from leaning back into him.

“Whoa.” Eddie couldn’t help wishing it came from Buck’s mouth instead of Chim’s. But he squashed that feeling, reminding himself once again that this could never happen.

“It's, uh, kind of cheating submitting pictures by a professional photographer,” Buck said, a little dejectedly as he walked away.

Eddie couldn’t help but laugh as he imagined the ego his niece was going to have once he told her someone thought her pictures were professional. “The photographer's 12. She's my niece. She's a master at the iPhone filters.”

“Your niece did this?”

“Yeah.” He smiled remembering the photo shoot she set up. She was so excited to help when he asked. Honestly, he didn’t care one wit about the calendar. He remembered coming home after his first day, replaying every moment in his mind. And he remembered how Buck looked when everyone brought up the calendar. He wasn’t doing this to be mean, but he couldn’t help it. He wanted Buck’s attention, good or bad.

“You think she'd be willing to take my submission pics for me? I'm told I photograph like an Asian Fabio.”

“Sure she would, yeah. Yeah.”

“Ah, you know, you really shouldn't get his hopes up like that. No offense, Chim.” Eddie bit the inside of his cheek. God, he was attracted to an asshole, what a surprise.

“No offense taken, Evan.”

Chimney walked away and Eddie ran a gloved and through his hair walking up to Buck. Buck could have a problem with him all he wants, but he draws a line when it starts affecting the rest of the team.

“What's your problem, man?”

“Okay. You. You're my problem. Your comfort level. You're-you're not supposed to just walk in here like you've been here for years. It's meant-meant to be a getting-to-know-you period. You're meant to respect your elders.”

Eddie had to bite his tongue to stop him from saying something that could break everything. Luckily Chim spoke up with, “You're not his elder, Buck,” making him smile. His anger drained enough to calmly reply.

“Look, I in no way meant to, uh, be too familiar or step on anybody's toes. I know you're going through some personal stuff right now.”

“What personal stuff?” Eddie was surprised by Buck’s sincere confusion. Maybe he thought the rest of the team weren’t a bunch of gossips filling Eddie in on everything, and he means everything, to do with Station 118.

“I know your girlfriend recently broke up with you and you're coming to terms with that.”

And boy, any anger he had at Buck melted away. Because the way she did it, the way she just ghosted Buck out of her life, Eddie understood that. Understood how hard it was to come to terms with that. Buck needed to misdirect some of his anger and it happened to fall on him.

“No, I'm not. And she didn't break up with me. Who told you that?” Ah, denial. He remembers that stage all too well. His abuela was the one who helped him realize what had happened, helped him admit to himself that he was a single parent now. 

“I'm just saying I hear you're a good guy, and I'm sorry you're going through pain, but you don't need to take it out on me or-or be threatened by me. We're on the same team.” God, he just wanted them to move past this. He didn’t want to deal with this alpha male bullshit. He moved his son and his life across the country and just needed a friend, not another person he needed to defend against.

“Why would I be threatened by you?”

“Exactly. There's no need to be. We do the same thing. I've just done it while people are shooting at me is all.” Okay, he probably shouldn’t have said the last part. But he was sick of this. Sick of this competition. And if this shut Buck up then so be it. With that, he turned and headed towards the showers.

“We're not broken up,” Buck called behind him.

“Alright.”


	3. Chapter 3

Eddie waited in the back of the ambulance while Buck and Cap went into the house. He started prepping, pulling out fluids and bandages, not quite knowing how serious it was, but if it’s anything like he’d seen...He shook his head trying to dispel the images that brought to mind.

Instead, he turned his thoughts to Buck. His head has been filled with thoughts of the other man since they’ve met, much to his chagrin. After their encounter the other day, Eddie had lost all hope that anything would get better. Buck was this alpha macho man who could only see Eddie as competition. What frustrated Eddie the most was that he didn’t even know what they were competing for!

Since then, Eddie had tried to stay professional, but aloof. He wasn’t going to get into anything no matter how Buck provoked him. Yes, the tension sucked whenever they were in the same room, but other than that, Eddie loved his job and his new co-workers. It made him feel like this move wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

A few minutes later, Cap’s voice came over the walkie and a fellow paramedic (Eli, Eddie reminded himself) rushed in with a gurney. Buck and Eli came out several minutes later with Cap behind. Eddie could hear him calling ahead to the hospital. 

“I've got an adult male, age 65, with a large piece of shrapnel in his right thigh. Femoral artery damage with profuse bleeding, ten minutes out.”

Shit, this wasn’t good. Eddie helped Eli get the gurney into the ambulance and quickly checked the bandages on the man’s leg and got him set up with fluids. For the corner of his eye, Eddie could see Cap saying something stern to Buck, who then slumped and hopped into the ambulance next to him. Eddie ignored his entrance and pretended to double check his work. He really wished it was Eli instead.

“Hey, Nash, am I gonna be all right?” the man called out.

“My boys have got you. But you might want to consider switching to collecting baseball cards after this.”

The tension was suffocating as Eddie continued to do his job and pretended to do his job to avoid Buck, who was taking care of the wound.

Of course, Buck just had to break the silence. “I guess you've seen a lot of shrapnel wounds.” 

“My share.” Eddie didn’t want to make conversation. He wanted them to sit in nice, terse silence for as long as it took to get to the hospital and then call it a night where he can go home and pretend this whole situation didn’t suck. 

“You ever seen a guy with a length of rebar stuck through his skull?” Buck’s challenging tone grated at his nerves. He was exhausted by this whole thing.

Eddie finally turned to look at the other man. He looked as tired as Eddie felt, and still managed to be breathtaking.“What are we measuring here, Buck?” He saw Buck’s eyes widen in surprise like he thought Eddie wouldn’t call him out on his shit and take the bait instead. He held his gaze until Charlie broke it with a groan. His eyes darted to the wound and saw more red than he liked. “Need to change those dressings. They're soaking through.” He turned to Charlie. “Hang in there, Charlie. Almost there.”

Buck was only silent for a blessed moment as he removed the bloodied bandages. “I'm just saying, working the streets of L.A. is not exactly stress-free. May not be the same kind of pressure you have in a war zone, but-” Buck just kind of ended there and Eddie took a moment for him to continue and to construct his response when he looked at the open wound and saw a flash of gold in all that red.

“Oh, come on.” Eddie moved closer to make sure it wasn’t a trick of the light. “Hold on. I thought you said this was a practice round.”

“It is.” Charlie looked up at him with wide eyes.

“Uh, what-what-what's going on?” Buck was sitting straight, hands held away from the wound and looking as worried as Charlie. It twisted something in Eddie’s get seeing Buck scared.

“You see that cap? Practice rounds have blue caps. Gold caps are live. Pull over!” He slammed his hand against the cab wall, heart racing like a jackrabbit. He had to get them out of there before it was too late.

He felt his pulse calm as the ambulance slowed down and started to compartmentalize. The was a dangerous weapon around innocent people. He had to stay calm. He let Buck hop out before him and made there way over to Cap and the bomb squad.

Jim, the head of the bomb squad team, held out an x-ray of Charlie’s leg. “Yup. There she is.” The grenade was a large white shape, benign-looking on paper.  
“He's got a live round embedded in his thigh.” Bobby sounded impressed.

“Uh, I thought this thing already went off,” Buck said, confused.

Eddie was sure Jim could explain it, but he had the practical knowledge. Bomb squad probably didn’t have to deal with grenades much. “The launch grenade has two components: gunpowder which makes it travel and an explosive charge that makes it go boom.”

“Okay, so why didn't this one go boom?” Eddie was pleasantly surprised by Buck’s question. Usually, when he starts talking weapons, people who aren’t military inclined just nod and smile and it always made him feel like they were waiting for him to finish. Eddie was a bit excited to show off his knowledge.

“It's fitted with a proximity fuse. It's a little smart sensor that tells the cap it's traveled a safe enough distance from the shooter to explode. From his hand to his leg probably wasn't far enough.”

“Well, we can't bring him inside a hospital full of people, not with that still stuck inside him,” Bobby said, gesturing towards the hospital.

“We called the military for help.”

“The military? Uh, can't you do it? You're the bomb squad.” Buck asked. Eddie noticed his tone sounded similar to when he was talking to Buck earlier. Challenging. Maybe that was his default. Before he could analyze it further he realized he zoned out a bit in the conversation. 

“He doesn't have an hour.” Eddie could hear the finality in Buck’s voice. Eddie couldn’t let a man die when he was right there to help him.

“I can do it. If he doesn't go to surgery soon, he'll die.”

“You've done this before?” 

Technically no, he’d never done anything like this. All his experience was with the aftermath, but he had to do something. So in a confident, maybe somewhat cocky voice, he said, “Well, none of the guys I served with were dumb enough to shoot a live round in themselves, but I'm familiar with the ordinance.”

“I'm in.” Eddie froze. He had no fucking clue what he was doing and was only planning on putting himself and a man who would die if he didn’t try. He didn’t want Buck in there with him, but he couldn’t say anything without blowing his cover. He took a deep breath. Compartmentalize. Do the job, keep everyone safe.

He and Buck were equipped with bomb squad vests and Jim came to him with an ammo box and a claw. “You get that thing out of him, put it in here and get the hell away from it. Let us deal with it.”

“Copy that.” He said with a nod and heading past Buck with a tap to his shoulder. “See you inside.”

***

“How are you feeling there, Charlie?” “

Like a world-class idiot. My wife, if she was still alive, she'd be here now saying, ‘I told you so.’ Well, maybe she'll be able to tell me in person in about a minute.”

“Well, that conversation's gonna have to wait.” Buck said, sternly, “Nobody's leaving this life tonight. Start the drip.”

The last was directed at him and as he prepared it he asked, “What branch did you say you were in, Charlie?

“I didn't. I always wanted to be a Marine. I tried to enlist during 'Nam, but I was 4F, an enlarged heart. So instead, I spent the last 40 years teaching seventh grade.”

“See there, Charlie? Not all heroes serve on the battlefield.” He hoped Buck heard, like really heard that. Teachers, the police, firefighters, doctors of all types, friends who listen, literally anyone who has done a kind thing ever, are all heroes. Buck’s had something against him since the day they’ve met, especially after learning he was in the military. He’s been there before, men who feel devalued by him just because he exists. If it would just get through Buck’s thick skull that he has nothing to compare with Eddie, maybe, just maybe, they could be friends.

“That's very kind of you to say that.”

”You ready?” He asked Buck, the tension of the situation flowing between them.

“Yeah.” Busk said with a nod, removing the bandages, “He's losing a lot of blood.”

“Keep pressure on it.” Buck began to add pressure and Eddie's heart jolted. “Not-not too much pressure.” Eddie maneuvered the claw into the wound trying to spread it a bit wider to see the grenade. “There it is.”

“All right, so-so pull it out. Come on.” Again with the challenging tone. This time, however, Eddie could detect a hint of fear as an undertone. Despite the fear, Buck’s hands remained firm.

“I got to be careful. The sensor measures the distance traveled based on how many rotations the shell made after the launch. The key is not to turn the shell while we pull it out.”

“Okay, yeah, so don't turn it.” _Thanks Buck, very helpful._ Almost as an afterthought, he added, “You got this.”

Eddie clamped the claw around the grenade and gently tugged it. The resistance of the muscle pulling against it had Eddie gently twisting it from its hold. “Gonna have to...just a bit.” With a last little tug and twist, it came out. “Get the box.” Eddie carefully, so carefully, place the thing in the box. Relief flooded him. He did it! And everyone is safe, no one is going to die tonight, not on his watch. Buck gently placed the box on the floor and they quickly rolled Charlie out to the hospital doors.

Eddie watched Charlie disappear behind the doors. Now that the danger was over Eddie let the realizations from before wash over him. Yes, Buck felt challenged by him and reacted to it, but then Buck is just a naturally challenging guy who probably got punch a lot for not realizing it. Back there, before all this, Buck was probably trying to connect with him the only way he knew how. If Eddie really thought about it, that conversation had a much different tone than their past ones.

As much as he didn’t want Buck in there with him in the first place, he was glad he was there. His calm (however faked it may have been) presence kept Eddie grounded, reminded him of how important it was to do this right.

He was ready to put the past behind him. With a determined nod, he turned to Buck. “You're badass under pressure, brother.”

“Me?” The shock in Buck’s voice made Eddie smile. 

“Hell yeah. You can have my back any day.”

“Yeah? Or, you know, you could,” The little lick of Buck’s lips almost had Eddie missing the rest. “you could have mine.”

Eddie huffed a laugh. It felt like a new beginning as they shook hands. “Deal.”

“Nice work, fellas. I'm glad you both made it out of there.”

“The guy's a professional, Cap. I was never really worried.” Eddie's heart jumped then, but he’d blame it on the explosion if anyone asked. Cap and Buck both turned to look at him with disbelief and he just shrugged.

“You guys hungry?” 

Buck let out a huff of a laugh. “You, my friend, are something else.” He shook his head before tapping him on his shoulder. “Sorry man, can’t. Got a phone date tonight with Abby.”

Eddie felt a twist in his gut. Right, Buck had this amazing girlfriend, supposedly. This was a good reminder for Eddie. He couldn’t be falling for anyone right now, especially for one of his coworkers. 

“No problem, Buck.” Well, there was nothing wrong with making a friend.


End file.
